4 December 2010

Southwark Council submission on 343 buses

Click on the letter below to see the letter which Southwark council has submitted to Transport for London (TfL) regarding, among other things, the 343 bus route. Some readers will recall our submission to the consultation on changes to the bus route. Whilst welcoming the increase in frequency of the buses we wanted the council to make it clear to TfL that 343 buses need to slow down when they go through residential areas.

The letter above is from the Cabinet Member for Transport and Environment, Barrie Hargrove to Gary Murphy at the Consultation and Engagement Centre at Transport for London. Councillor Hargrove concludes his letter by writing: "I would be grateful foran assurance that the timetable acknowledges this and that there is no imperative for drivers to exceed this speed in order to maintain timetabled headways."

I've asked Cllr Hargrove to keep me updated on whether or not he gets the assurance he asks for. We hope that the message will start to get through to TfL that there is problem with speeding 343 buses and it needs to get sorted out.

2 comments:

I think that they speed up as they go downhill (!) and also when they whizz through very narrow bits of street where they may have quite a narrow time window to get all the way through without getting trapped by cars coming the other way.

One way to reduce this might be to move the bus stops so that the driver knows he may have to stop and doesn't enjoy the downward slope so much. The buses are probably not speeding (the distance is too short to build up much speed) but I agree they are often going too fast for a narrow residential road.

I am a very frequent 343 bus user and the part around Southampton Way is usually a very sedate trundle. No hills (all flat) and very frequent bus stops with lots of passengers.

The 343 is causing a severe problem on Cheltenham and Ivydale Roads due to the atrocious condition of the road surface and the traffic calming humps, which are breaking up. I am trying to gather support to present a petition at the next Road Traffic meeting. If you are interested please look at the blog at www.ivydale.posterous.com

Renata Hamvas

Victoria Mills

Who are we?

Gavin Edwards, Renata Hamvas and Victoria Mills were elected as the councillors for Peckham Rye Ward in the 2010 Local Elections. We all live locally and feel passionately about improving our area and protecting our community resources. You can join our Facebook group for local news updates here.